To set an angel free

“I saw an angel in the block of marble and I just chiselled ’til I set him free” — Michelangelo

It is September 8, 1504, and an angel has just been set free. On this day, the world first saw a rejected block of marble turn into a Renaissance masterpiece — one that would go on to be the most loved in history.

Some 500 years later, the face of this angel continues to dominate pop culture — its many iterations serving as tattoos and posters, among others.

Rejected by other artists for being flawed (confirmed by modern scientific analyses), a block of white Italian Carrara marble became a young visionary’s muse.

It took Michelangelo, all of 26 when he was commissioned to create David, about three years to chisel the 17-foot, 12,000-pound depiction of the Biblical hero who, against all odds, took down the giant Goliath with a sling, beheading him later.

His David stands out from the other depictions of the hero, who was often shown as a young boy, perhaps to emphasise the contrast between him and Goliath.

Michelangelo, however, chose to intricately portray David as a young man moments before battle, sans the sword in one hand and Goliath’s head in the other — a common depiction in other portrayals of the time.

Some hypothesise that this was due to the narrowness of the marble block, which might also be the reason for David being slenderer than Michelangelo’s other ‘angels’.

David stands tall, literally and figuratively, preparing for battle with just a sling over his left shoulder, a rock concealed in his right hand, his piercing eyes an amalgam of determination and worry.

As we move further down, it is apparent that David is not very ‘well endowed’, perhaps due to the virtues of modesty in Christianity, perhaps due to its Greek symbolism — a source of inspiration for Michelangelo — of great intellect.

The Opera del Duomo had commissioned the work to be part of a series of statues to be placed along the roofline of the Cathedral of Florence in 1501. The disproportionately large head and hands of Michelangelo's David are no accident — the idea was that they could be visible from a distance.

Owing to its weight, it was decided that the statue would be placed at the Palazzo della Signoria instead, where it lived in all its glory till 1873, when it was moved to the Galleria dell’Accademia to protect it from damage, with a replica mimicking the craftsmanship of the statue being placed at its original location.

The decision to place David at the town hall was, at least in part, political. The statue, and the lore, became a symbol of resistance for Florence, then trying to establish itself as a republic.

Today, the face of David, like that of Mona Lisa, can be found on several pieces of apparel — some with sunglasses, others with faces of pop culture icons replaced by his — much to the dismay of many traditional art connoisseurs, who argue that David has lost its sanctity over the years.

Ship of Theseus is a thought experiment centred around Theseus, the mythical king of Athens who rescued King Minos' children and escaped onto a ship. Every year after, Athenians commemorated the event by embarking on a pilgrimage on the ship.

Philosophers, however, question that if, after years of repair and maintenance, every part of the ship was replaced, would it still be the same ship?

Perhaps, to set an angel, and art, free is to detach it from the artist and what led to its conception, and to accept all the perceptions of it that people may find solace in. Perhaps, art is not immortalised by intention, but by impact.